The Brave Babes Battle Bus - Whacking The Wine Witch Round The Chops (With Barry The Squid).

[Mouseface]

Hello, I'm Mouse :)

I'm one of the Brave Babes who's travelling on this wonderful, magical, mysterious Bus, trying to hold onto my sobriety for me, and for my family.

I do drink but thanks to this Bus, I've kicked the vodka addiction into touch and the evil WineWitch has been banished far, far away so I now drink in a controlled manner, One Day At A Time. :)

By that, I mean that just for today, I won't be drinking. Tomorrow, however, I will be because it's a very special occasion. The day after will be dealt with when I wake, and the day after that, the day after etc.....

We're a Bus filled with some fantastic posters, some who drink, some who don't touch a drop ever and some who are on/off drinkers who have lovely warm seats in the side-car, some are hanging onto the roof-rack by the tips of their fingers and trying their best to resist the dreaded WineWitch's charms night after night. But they are trying, and that's all that any of us can do, is keep trying, keep starting again!

So, if you think that you're drinking too much (you probably are) why not come and say hi? We won't bite - unless you ask very nicely, manners cost nothing .

There's lots of seats so pick whichever one you like and have a . Just jump in, we're not a judgemental pack of quiche makers

And here's a bit of light reading for you.... our latest thread and the very first one, the reason we're all here.

PREVIOUS THREAD

FIRST EVER THREAD

Tears of relief here for purple coming back and ma thank god things are looking up. purple don't do that to us again, we need you, we all need each and every babe here x x x

Purple glad u r back :-) I missed u even for short time!!

Thx isinde I think lonely and tired then main ones. But also maybe im welcoming loneliness as preferable to being with wrong perspn in my case anyway.

isinde I loved that post about tossing a message-in-a-bottle into the internet, and sometimes it gets picked up and other times it sinks beneath the waves

Great post Isindie, I have been really feeling like a drink tonight because of all of HALT. I phoned my mum for an hour once I got little boy to bed, I've had a packet of nik naks (not exactly healthy!) I've had some diet Pepsi, these things are all helping. I've messaged & spoke about why I'm feeling so fed up and I'm playing the night to the end in my head & thinking of how awful tomorrow will be and by having the drink I will be keeping this cycle going.

Night all, my MN layout has gone weird.... all odd looking so I'm offski.

Koti - I am sorry I missed you post earlier today about being ignored, having read back, I've now seen it.

Massive hugs to you sweets, as Lemony says, STAY!!! xx

Purps - knew you'd have to come back just for a mo :)

Stay safe all xxxxx

Night night lovely Mouse.

Hope all nice and peaceful in house of mouse
xxxxxx

. Don't even think about leaving, sister.
kotinka how are you doing?
Serious about collating all the contact information. Who knows who might need it next? I'm happy to collect info, but crap at spreadsheets.

Thanks all for the support, I really appreciate it.

lonnika, 11 days is very impressive! Hadn't heard of the HALT technique... thanks Isindie.

I'm afraid I have fallen off the wagon (or bus?) already. I gave up on work and then convinced DH to pick up two mini-bottles of wine on his way home. I think he relented partly because he loves a glass of wine too, especially on Friday night; the difference is that he can stop at one or two. As soon as I had the drink, my nausea and headache disappeared. It was virtually instantaneous. I guess that is chemical dependency. DH is now proposing that we only drink on the weekends. I don't know; I am just starting to feel totally out of control with alcohol at the moment, and wanted to do a complete detox. I want to know what it's like to be completely sober again. I am disappointed at myself for giving in so soon, but at least I have only had a couple of units' worth tonight, whereas on a Friday night I would normally have a bottle and then some. I will read the Allen Carr book over the weekend and try to bolster my resolution.

The sugar info is interesting; thanks to people who mentioned it.

Mintyy, you could be right about having some other illness, because it's true I didn't drink that much more than normal the other night when I became so violently sick. At the time I assumed it was because the wine was fizzy and so it went to my head more quickly, but still, it's weird... and both DC have been sick since then, so maybe it's a virus going around. I suppose any pretext is good for stopping drinking though! At the time I felt so guilty. I know I need to stop because someday someone is going to smell alcohol on my breath in the morning at work and that is going to be crap professionally. Of course the professional reason isn't the only or main reason to stop drinking, but I am worried about jeopardising a career that I've worked hard for. Also, this may be paranoia, but I'm convinced that my short-term memory is going. That could just be my age though.

LOL at ohclutter! you don't need to be a walking advertisement.

Impressed by you, ohclutter. I have a crazy energetic 2-year-old DS and I hate trying to get the DC to bed on my own when DH is out.

Don't want to spam the thread with posts, but I have just read back a little and am horrified about how hard it was for Ma's brother to get help. Thank God he is finally getting some now.

Koala's posts are very inspiring.

Welcome newbies I'm still newbie ish my self please don't go purple your post inspire me all the time end of day 3 for me here's to day 4 ps ma glad you got your help for Richard

Have been sitting at the back of the bus since I jumped on on Tuesday and I've been busy listening to you all and reading back over past posts.

You are all such wonderful, inspirational and wise women.
Can relate to so many things that have been written and I feel I have learnt so much about myself this week and why I turn to drink. Has made me question so much in my life and I've admitted to myself that I have NEVER had my drinking under control. I am now completely exhausted from all the thinking!!

Am off out tomorrow night, is last thing I feel like but I owe it to my friends to catch up with them.
But I have a plan.
I will be in control.
I will NOT let my sons down.

I can't name check everyone so I'm not going to name check anyone but please know how honoured I have felt to read each of your honest and personal posts.

Here's to a wonderful weekend to you all xxxx

Oh and I am not religious so please dont think I am preaching but a friend wrote the serenity prayer on Facebook this week and I realised how much it was relevant to myself and probably all of us on the bus :

"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can
and wisdom to know the difference"

fullof I thing that the thing with HALT is that for years (well it was years in my case) we have been using alcohol to medicate everything - feeling happy - have a drink, feeling sad - have a drink on and on and on so that eventually I got to the stage where my only response to any physical or emotional feeling was to have a drink, and I kind of lost the link between the feeling of need or lack, and working out exactly what it was that I was needing.

So the kind of HALT approach that Isindie described helped in several ways. Firstly it was a distraction - whenever I felt like I needed a drink I tried to satisfy the other needs first. If I did it all properly it would take an hour or an hour and a half, and amazingly the edge would have gone from my craving. But more importantly, over the months I have relearned what I really want. For me it is often because I've not drunk enough water / juice / tea etc and my body is dehydrated. And very often I'm hungry. So a couple of big glasses of water and some beans on toast usually do the job. And these days (without the booze) I'm much better at dealing properly with difficult emotional feelings like anger, loneliness, sadness, fear and guilt.

That's a great prayer fightlikeagirl, think I want to print that out to put it somewhere I can see it.
Like that you have a plan for tomorrow, wishing you well
Night night brave babes xx

marfisa I'd say that the only way to fight this is to do it on your terms not your dh's. If you think you need to stop completely then you're probably right. Your dh is proposing a very sensible approach for someone who is overdrinking by a glass or two a week, but I guess that's not you! Maybe you can get to that point but I'd suggest that you follow your own instincts. I can only say that trying to moderate my drinking for the sake of other people led me into very secretive and destructive drinking patterns

Also don't minimise your hangover by wishing it away as a 'bug'. If I could have a glass bottle of wine for every time I'd done that (quite genuinely in my warped thinking) well...... The hard facts are that alcohol is a poison - tolerated well in small quantities, but drinking a bottle and a half is a big toxic load on your body. Think of the first time your ever got really drunk and sick. I bet it was less than a bottle and a half of wine (fizz or not). Your body has become accustomed to dealing with alcohol and the enzymes in your liver will have racked up to deal with it. But if you do have a cold or a bug, your body is busy dealing with that, so the pain you are feeling is more of the true feeling of your body dealing with the toxin that is alcohol.

ma great news about Richard. I shall immediately cancel paying my tax (some of which must go to funding the NHS) and I will give it all to the SA.

Oh, except the NHS are providing wonderful care for my dm who is very sick, and I don't think HMRC would understand my reasoning, so instead I will make a big donation to SA, trusting that another 'Richard' will also be helped. xxx

purple I post rarely these days - partly because I'm rather overwhelmed with life and all it brings and dumps at my door, but also because although every painful jolt of this journey remains acutely in my memory, I'm not actually so tightly held in the grip of drinking, and I have a horrible fear of appearing smug. But please know that none of those memories have lessened over the past couple of years and I empathise 100% with every bump and jolt of the journey of everyone on here. It serves to remind me that the partition between where I am now and where I could be is still paper thin and times. Almost 3 years on from beginning this journey I'm not 'cured' but I'm mostly safe from breaking through the paper thin wall.

And every single person who posts on here, whether drunk or sober, whether posting about drink or about other life things, each post is part of the tapestry fo threads that keeps me sober. So thank you.

And for those of you will little children I saw a great thing in a local shop today:

Dad was there (with his briefcase in one hand and a big bag of kid-paraphernalia in the other). His dd (probably aged about 4) was 'helping' by carrying the shopping basket. They got to the end of one aisle and Dad went round the corner. 30 seconds later his dd shouts "Dad, I've had an accident". Fearing the worst (probably wet knickers) Dad comes to investigate. dd says "I had an accident. I meant to get an apple, but this bag of sweets fell into the shopping basket instead."

Actually I remember having quite a lot of similar 'accidents' when a bottle of gin would fall into my shopping trolley!

and apologies for the the post dump. Night night babes.

Some great overnight posts :) Marfasia I agree with Venus - if u want to give up completely go for it :)
Day 12 here - Today i will not be drinking.

Sorry if I was negative yesterday. I stumbled on this thread by accident when I was trying to cut down. Read the first ever thread and decided to stop - for first few days when I wanted to drink i carried on read all the other threads on the topic - it really helped me. Thanks to all.
Venus I have used alcohol to suppress my appetite or years - I think that is why HalT work for me.
Have a good day all :) L

Morning all! Gosh this bus is hurtling along right now. Okay purps I am guilty as charged I also read your post and didn't respond. I agree with everything isinde so eloquently put about the bus and the bottles. I hope you'll reconsider and that you find the support you need, here and in RL.

Welcomes new babes and waves to old. Too many bottles since my last one to pick up and name check but I'm reading and thinking of you all. (From the sidecar) I will also be donating yo the Sally Army God bless them. Good luck for the weekend ma he has hope now x

Hi venus and everyone. I c what u mean and how halt can help to distract from cravings. My problem yesterday was related to feeling v upset due to job insecurity and then bad argument with ex husband over money. My instinct then is to hit the ww! I need to give up totally and feel better when I do. I also dont feel it has a massive overwhelming hold on me and I can avoid it. I am starting back on day 1 today and wIll be keeping of it no matter what happens. I know next week is going to be 1 of the toughest ever as I think I will get months notice as all funding gone. I will be pleased with myself if I get through that with no ww though!!